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Anand downs Gelfand, struggles to move up

Vishwanathan Anand scored a win and stayed ahead in rapidplay standings and, in the process, climbed to the joint fourth place in overall standings in the Amber rapid and blindfold chess torunament in Monte Carlo.

The Indian defeated Boris Gelfand in rapid play and then drew with him in blindfold for a good 1.5-0.5 result. Vladimir Kramnik got a 2-0 result from Vassily Ivanchuk and that enabled Kramnik to extend his lead over the rest of the field in overall standings. He has nine points from six rounds while Veselin Topalov and Joel Lautier share the second place with 7.5 points each. Anand, Alexi Shirov and Anatoly Karpov have 6.5 points each in the joint fourth place.

After six rounds Anand has 4.5 out of six in the rapidplay event, half a point clear of Topalov and Kramnik. Kramnik has five out of six in the blindfold event ahead of Shirov on 4.5.

Kramnik collected an important point from Ivanchuk, who took positional risks with advancing his e-pawn to e4 and then did not play aggressively enough to justify this action. In the end the black pawns fell and he lost.

Anand did not achieve any major advantage from the Sicilian Najdorf against Boris Gelfand, but then with the latter faltering, he outmaneuvered him for a good win. The game lasted 38 moves and by the end, gelfand was hopelessly tangled up on positional play.

In blindfold, Anand and Gelfand drew in 28 moves from an English Opening. There are five rounds to go and a maximum of 10 points for Anand to get, as he bids to climb higher up the ladder.

Karpov continued to have problems with black and he lost to Ljubojevic after an inaccurate opening. Ljubojevic handed Karpov yet another defeat with black in a short 20-move Queen's Gambit Accepted. But Karpov avenged that in blindfold with a 30-move win in Modern Benoni.

Kramnik won the rapid game in 54 moves from Nimzo Indian while he needed just 26 moves from black in an English Game in blindfold.

UNI